Heidegger

>Axiom 0: Allegations of Demolition
>
>2. What is a Predicate?
>
>Michael Eldred wrote:
>
> >first signification, a sentence is composed of subject + copula
> >+ predicate.
>
> >For the second signification, a sentence is composed of subject +
> >predicate, where the predicate, in turn, is composed of copula +
> >’predicate in the first sense’.
>
>it is good to see that you are coming around to the view I expressed
>several months ago:
>
>as I’ve said before, there are two popular ways to parse a simple
>sentence like ‘the ball is red’:
>
>1: Subject - Copula - Predicate
>
>2: Subject - Predicate (Copula - Complement)
>
>in either case ‘the ball’ is the subject.
>
>according to the first system for parsing a sentence, ‘is’ is the
>copula; and, ‘red’ is the predicate. thus, a predicate that is not
>explicitly present would be implicit.
>
>according to the second system for parsing a sentence, ‘is red’ is the
>predicate; but, this system would break down the predicate into its
>constituent parts: copula and complement. thus, a complement that is not
>explicitly present would be implicit.
>
>[end quote from 2007-10-12 (Are you Denying that the Copula can have an
>Implicit Complement?)]
>
> >There is even a third signification in there of a predicate to the
> >exclusion “of any adjunct”.
>
>in the sentence ‘the ball is red today’, the adjunct is ‘today’. this
>third signification merely means that ‘today’ is not part of the
>predicate.
>
>the following is an extract from the Wikipedia article on grammatical
>adjuncts:
>
>In linguistics, an adjunct is a sentence element that establishes the
>circumstances in which the action or state expressed by the verb take
>place.
>
>The following sentence uses adjuncts of time and place:
>
> Yesterday Lorna saw the dog in the garden.
>
>This definition can be extended to include adjuncts that modify nouns or
>other parts of speech (see noun adjunct):
>
> The large dog in the garden is very friendly.
>
>Adjuncts are always extranuclear; that is, removing an adjunct leaves a
>grammatically well-formed sentence. They can thus be contrasted with
>complements. All adjuncts are adverbials.
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adjunct]
>
>======================================================================
>
>How do any of these ’significations’ help you establish that ‘is/am’ is
>a predicate in sentences like ‘it is’ or ‘I am’?
>
>======================================================================
>
>very puzzled, I am.
>
>Joe

Not that it’s relevant to the conversation, but because Hebrew is the
only language I know anything about, I’d like to bring it in as an
example of the theological complexities of life without copulas. The
following is a transliteration of a central sentence of Hebrew
doctrine:

Shma Yisrael YHWH elohenu YHWH echad.

Literally translated, the words mean “Hear Israel YHWH our god YHWH
one (or alone).

Having to place the copula somewhere in order to translate the
sentence into English, the language of record, we could say

Hear Israel YHWH is our god YHWH alone.

or

Hear Israel, YHWH our god YHWH is one

It seems grammar and punctuation are all about emphasis, pointing
out, which would seem to make considerable difference.

May your new year be a happy one.

May your new year be one happy new year.

Allen

Posted on Monday, December 31st, 2007 at 11:35 pm
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